Tag: emotion

In-vitro meat (IVM) is one of those subjects that could quickly get out of hand in the minds of an uninformed public, and this post is my small part in countering the entropy of reason. Hmm, is it still entropy if the reasoning was never there to begin with?

In my discussions with those unfamiliar with it, the first reaction seems to be one of disgust. Maybe due to the increasing familiarity with Genetically Modified Foods (GMO), especially with the increasing notoriety of Monsanto (as if they were the first and last step in GMO). But, as in any foray into the unknown, as Bertrand Russell puts it: first you must begin with the facts, and move on from there. So let’s get to the facts of meat today, and then with those of IVM. One thing we must get out-of-the-way before we begin: human-beings will not just stop eating meat, so any philosophical or personal objection to the practice of meat-eating is bunk. One person’s (or even a billion persons) objection to the practice of eating meat is irrelevant, it’s simply a part of life and must be dealt with.

In light of the recently proposed anti-blasphemy laws in the UN (which I think is bullshit), and the (misrepresented) furor of the Middle East in regards to that stupid film, Innocence of Muslims, I recently watched a debate on Freedoms of Speech with the late Christopher Hitchens and Shashi Tharoor. Their respective points summarized go something like this:

Shashi Tharoor – Against an anti-blasphemy law, thinks that statements should be said in retrospect to the opposing party, being unable to effectively envision their reaction, not that that condones the sporadic violent outbursts. As such, a censor of public opinion is unavoidable.

Christopher Hitchens – Speak your mind, first and foremost, always. Censorship is all or nothing. Exceptions here or there only serve to convolute and are divisive in nature, nor could any person, one or many, objectively do such a job of fair censorship even if it was to be required. Censorship of public opinion should always be ignored

The title of this post may surprise you as rather odd. After all, what could religion and milk possibly have in common?? Well, surprisingly, one key factor, but I’ll get to that later. Most of us have been raised to drink milk to make us big, healthy and strong by way of the calcium, vitamin D and other nutrients present in cow-milk.

Late last year, I read online that an Ice Cream shop in London had begun using human breast milk in a select few of their ice creams. I was intrigued by the concept, and now and then, I would ask friends if they would ever try it. The usual response is a scrunched up face, following by something like, “How disgusting!”. I couldn’t see what all the fuss was about.

I would like to counter a certain attitude that always seems to be prevalent in the theological world; that of God, emotion and thinking.

God loves us, sometimes he can be angry, he created us for >insert reason here< and other such sentiments.

First, let us discuss what an emotion is:

“Emotion is a complex psychophysiological experience of an individual’s state of mind as interacting with biochemical (internal) and environmental (external) influences”

If God exists, and is outside of this Universe, then he presumably has no environment, and no environmental influences, and we can rule out the possibility of him being biochemical, so it is safe to assume that God is incapable of emotion, and love, or hate us and anything else. If there is an external environment from whence he lives, and if he is indeed biochemical, then he cannot be omniscient or omnipotent, but simply a being.

We have physicists in our own little Universe wanting to create other Universes, so if they were to do so, and life is born in their new Universe, are they to be regarded as all-powerful and all-knowing Gods?

God and thinking. The application of thought, when considered objectively, is a weakness. The need of thinking arises out of an absence of total knowledge and information. One therefore does not have all the pieces of the puzzle in the act of thinking, and must come to a conclusion with incomplete information.

I am hungry, therefore I need food, so I need to go to the grocery store to buy some conveniently placed food. Hmm, but if I goto the farmers market farther away, I can get healthier food and be better off in the long term. Do I opt for convenience or health?

Thinking is a result of being an imperfect being, and therefore not the quality of a all-knowing, all-powerful God.

The Abrahamic God, that egomaniacal war criminal who sometimes loves us cannot be real. It defies logic, and even faith itself.

Much of what constitutes faith today, isn’t really faith but the selective understanding and slim pickings of certain parts of Holy Books that align with a persons predetermined knowledge, or ignorance. This is why most Christians don’t convert to Islam, even though logically, the Quran is an extension of the Bible, God’s sequel if you will and thus, the next logical progression of their faith, but that doesn’t happen.

I would love to hear from a Christian, on why they haven’t up-verted to Islam.

In the Old Testament, God destroys the entire human race save for Noah and his family and 2 of each animal, whom repopulated the world… hmm, incest… because he was grieved by our creation, when we didn’t turn out the way He wanted us too, yet he gave us the free will to do as we please. Hmm, that makes sense. Clearly, this being is not worthy of the title God, and if such a God were to exist, he would not love us, nor hate us, but be neutral in his outlook to all things under his dominion, and thus still not be the Abrahamic God.

If there is indeed a God, then He/Them are either imperfect being/s, much as we are, though perhaps far more advanced, or we have simply anthropomorphized the Universe, and gave it the name God. My money is on the latter, though the former cannot ruled be out